Victorian Taxi Directorate exposes 400+ email addresses

Slaps head and promises to use CC: or BCC: next time

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The Victorian Taxi Directorate has earned the ire of people it was trying to placate, after it put more than 400 email addresses in the “To:” field of an email it sent to ask about its complaints resolution process.

The email, sent yesterday, said “The Victorian Taxi Directorate (VTD) is committed to continually improving its customer service and complaints handling processes,” and went on to say recipients should “... be assured that your personal details have been collected and used consistent with Privacy Act 2000.”

Except for their email addresses, that is, as 432 by The Register's count were included in the “To:” field for all recipients to see. Some have hit “Reply All”, creating a merry little email storm that is pleasing nobody.

Angry recipients, including Register readers, have pointed out the situation and its absurdity.

The Directorate has quickly apologised for the mess, with Assistant Manager of Communications Bob Nelson saying it is “absolutely not” the organisation's policy to share email addresses in this way.

“It was a genuine piece of human error,” he said. “They put the addresses into the wrong field instead of cc or bcc. The person who did it is feeling very regretful.”

“We sent another email getting in touch with everyone once we knew what had happened,” Nelson added. The organisation has also 'fessed up to the Privacy Commissioner about the mess.

Emails forwarded to The Register reveal the Privacy Commissioner is already chatting to the Directorate about the incident.®